The Modern Period examines how and why Americans adopted radically new methods of managing and thinking about menstruation during the twentieth century.
In the early twentieth century women typically used homemade cloth "diapers" to absorb menstrual blood, avoided chills during their periods to protect their health, and counted themselves lucky if they knew something about menstruation before menarche. New expectations at school, at play, and in the workplace, however, made these menstrual traditions problematic, and middle-class women quickly sought new information and products that would make their monthly periods less disruptive to everyday life.
Lara Freidenfelds traces this cultural shift, showing how Americans reframed their thinking about menstruation. She explains how women and men collaborated with sex educators, menstrual product manufacturers, advertisers, physical education teachers, and doctors to create a modern understanding of menstruation. Excerpts from seventy-five interviews—accounts by turns funny and moving—help readers to identify with the experiences of the ordinary people who engineered these changes.
The Modern Period ties historical changes in menstrual practices to a much broader argument about American popular modernity in the twentieth century. Freidenfelds explores what it meant to be modern and middle class and how those ideals were reflected in the menstrual practices and beliefs of the time.
This accessible study sheds new light on the history of popular modernity, the rise of the middle class, and the relationship of these phenomena to how Americans have cared for and managed their bodies.
The Johns Hopkins University Press
An informative and intellectually dense treatise... incorporating resources from feminist theory, history of science, anthropology, and medicine.
This is the best cultural history of menstruation of twentieth-century America.
None who read this will fail to appreciate the sheer power of suggestion that marketing creates... Today's 'modern' women are more open about getting their periods, but for the less comfortable among us, the bold-faced title, The Modern Period, suggests a history book and thus lends itself to being read comfortably in public places with nary an old-fashioned blush.
The Modern Period provides a rich picture of the changing public aspects of menstruation, by mining traditional historical sources such as the medical advice literature and advertisements for Kotex and Tampax. Freidenfelds goes further, however, and lets us in on the private aspects, on the discussions between mothers and daughters, boyfriends and girlfriends, and husbands and wives... Freidenfelds' deft use of these stories augments her solid social history with the seductive lure of eavesdropping.
The Modern Period is a good overview that combines the major themes raised by other secondary sources with original archival and interview research. It is well written and accessible to those new to the subject. It would be suitable for both undergraduate and graduate courses in medical history and gender studies.
— Judith Walzer Leavitt
A thorough and engaging history of menstruation... Her title, The Modern Period, is more than a succinct description; it cleverly references her discussion throughout of how advancing Progressive values shaped beliefs and practices surrounding menstruation. The diversity of age and ethnicity among Freidenfelds' interview participants is particularly striking and significant.
This book adds rich, varied, and interesting dimensions to what we knew about this important subject, and it should become required reading for anyone interested in the health of twentieth-century women.
The Modern Period provides a rich picture of the changing public aspects of menstruation, by mining traditional historical sources such as the medical advice literature and advertisements for Kotex and Tampax. Freidenfelds goes further, however, and lets us in on the private aspects, on the discussions between mothers and daughters, boyfriends and girlfriends, and husbands and wives... Freidenfelds' deft use of these stories augments her solid social history with the seductive lure of eavesdropping.
The Modern Period is a good overview that combines the major themes raised by other secondary sources with original archival and interview research. It is well written and accessible to those new to the subject. It would be suitable for both undergraduate and graduate courses in medical history and gender studies.
An informative and intellectually dense treatise... incorporating resources from feminist theory, history of science, anthropology, and medicine.
None who read this will fail to appreciate the sheer power of suggestion that marketing creates... Today's 'modern' women are more open about getting their periods, but for the less comfortable among us, the bold-faced title, The Modern Period, suggests a history book and thus lends itself to being read comfortably in public places with nary an old-fashioned blush.
This is the best cultural history of menstruation of twentieth-century America.
Using 75 oral interviews with ordinary American men and women ranging widely in age, class, and education levels, Freidenfelds (women's studies, Wellesley Coll.) examines the changes that took place in the ways women managed menstruation over the course of the 20th century. She cites the ideals of Progressivism, specifically the focus on a scientific approach to health, as the impetus to women's modern approach. As health experts and educators taught women earlier and more openly about menarche, women cooperated with product manufacturers and advertisers to adopt new disposable technologies that would better hide menstruation and provide comfort. Freidenfelds argues that innovations in menstrual management would not have been possible without the expansion of middle-class values and lifestyle expectations. The interview excerpts provide anecdotes to Freidenfelds's arguments and fill a gap in primary-source material on this topic. A good companion to Elizabeth Arveda Kissling's Capitalizing on the Curse: The Business of Menstruation and Sharra L. Vostral's Under Wraps: A History of Menstrual Hygiene Technology. Recommended especially for readers in gender studies.
—Kate Farley
Introduction 1
1 Before "Modern" Menstrual Management Keeping Secrets, Wearing Diapers, Avoiding Chills 13
2 The Modern Way to Talk about Menstruation Education, The Scientific Narrative, and Public Discussion 38
3 The Modern Way to Behave while Menstruating Changing Health Beliefs and Practices 74
4 The Modern Way to Manage Menstruation Technology and Bodily Practices 120
5 Tampons: A Case Study in Controversy 170
Conclusion 193
Acknowledgments 201
Appendix Interview Method 205
Notes 211
Essay on Sources 229
Index 237
Overview
The Modern Period examines how and why Americans adopted radically new methods of managing and thinking about menstruation during the twentieth century.
In the early twentieth century women typically used homemade cloth "diapers" to absorb menstrual blood, avoided chills during their periods to protect their health, and counted themselves lucky if they knew something about menstruation before menarche. New expectations at school, at play, and in the workplace, however, made ...